On a night of comedy and high farce at the Betfair World Championship in
Sheffield, the joke was on Dechawat Poomjaeng.

By John Skilbeck

8:11AM BST 26 Apr 2013

The 34-year-old Thai played the jester, just as he had in beating world No 5 Stephen Maguire, but he wound up trailing 7-1 in his second-round match against Wales’s Michael White.

He entered the arena with arms raised in triumph, jumped from the second step on to the stage floor and punched the air as though he had won the world title. Spotting Thailand’s national flag in the second row, he held out his arms in adoration and hugged MC Rob Walker passionately.

Qualifier White, 21, let none of the japery affect him, unlike referee Michaela Tabb, who later forgot to put the blue on the table for the break-off and also picked up the white for no apparent reason. She saw the funny side but clearly the frippery was causing the Scot’s mind to wander.

Where White was amassing his lead, making a 101 break for his first Crucible century in the process, Poomjaeng was fluking a black and punching himself in the head, missing a red and letting his head sink to the table in mock mourning. Incredibly he lost the fourth frame without a ball being potted when, after being put in an awkward position, he failed three times to hit a red, conceding three fouls. Under the game’s rules, three misses when a red can be hit full ball means the frame is conceded.

Poomjaeng’s showmanship, including jumping on the spot after potting a long red – which he followed by wildly missing the brown – meant his game suffered. He now faces a real fight to avoid a heavy defeat in this first-to-13-frame clash.

Earlier, Robert Milkins beat world No 2 Neil Robertson 10-8 and then revealed how friends had helped him to turn his life when he was struggling six years ago. The 37-year-old from Gloucester said: “I was just going out drinking every day; I got evicted and I was 30-grand in debt. I was lucky that some friends came along. I’d lost my mum, I’d lost my dad, I got divorced. It blew me apart. Now it’s all turned round.”